Pearse Doherty (Donegal South West, Sinn Fein)
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Question 225: To ask the Minister for Finance following the recent publication of a special report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, the steps taken by the National Assets Management Agency to verify that the €869m advanced to developers between April 2009 and the NAMA acquisition date, represented value for money for the taxpayer. [27955/12]

Michael Noonan (Limerick City, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy may be aware that the Central Bank issued a letter to certain financial institutions in April 2009 which stated that funding advanced to debtors after 7 April 2009 by the institutions would not be subject to discount by NAMA if the institutions could satisfy NAMA that the funding was justifiable on commercial grounds. In terms of determining the commerciality or otherwise of funding advanced by them, the institutions were asked to apply for non-discount treatment for advances which, in their view, were covered by the Central Bank letter. I understand that NAMA put a very thorough process in place, backed up by a requirement for documentary evidence, to review applications made by the five participating institutions.

I am advised by NAMA that arising from that review, approval was granted for €971m of expenditure, which is 41% of the amounts for which the institutions made application. I understand that applications amounting to €1,411m made by the participating institutions to NAMA were rejected as not being commercially justifiable, including applications for development projects for which there was no proven demand and applications for overhead payments to debtors which NAMA considered to be excessive.

I am satisfied that the assessment process carried out by NAMA, and reviewed by the Comptroller and Auditor General, was designed with sufficient rigour to ensure that any approved expenditure would represent value for money for the taxpayer.